Within Ourselves
by 50shadesofphilly
Summary: Phil is depressed and wastes most of his time at the bar until a bright and struggling Dan comes along. Rated M for language and some suggestive themes/events.
1. Prologue: Past Reborn

Dan looked around himself, the light of the moon casting itself on the king-sized bed and his pale skin, the dark shadows of the trees looming over where he lay. It wasn't supposed to happen this way, he thought, there must be someone who can save me.

And so he left the room meant for two, which only inhabited a party of one.

* * *

Phil wasn't at the height of his senses, never was. Every day he slipped further and further, getting his mind lost in his own realities. The lost boy stopped himself from downing his sixth shot and found himself intrigued by a figure lurking near the door. The figure looked sober, and, what was that? Phil squinted and tried to read the figure's body language for any signs of emotion. He was about to give up when he saw it. The figure, a male probably slightly younger than himself, had started twitching and fidgeting. Each of his hands toyed with the other's fingers, twisting and pulling, scratching and squeezing. His head constantly whipping to better understand the atmosphere of the bar. He was afraid.

Phil had only known this not because of the boy's body language, but the look in his face. The terrified sparkle that once glittered in his own eyes all those years ago.


	2. One: Midnight Troubles

Phil stood from his stool and abandoned his small crystal glass. He tried to look as normal as possible when passing the other regulars, though they would probably be too hungover later to remember.

Phil slid quietly into the empty wall next to the stranger. He didn't seem to notice.

"Hello, there." Phil tried, adding a little awkward wave and a smile.

"Uh, hi, I guess…" the stranger replied shakily, turning away from Phil. The gears in Phil's head turned as he tried to conjure up a valid question.

"So what are you doing here?" Phil asked, a bit of his Northern accent slipping into his voice.

The stranger seemed to relax slightly and stuttered a little before getting his answer across.

"I'm looking for someone to fix me, t-"

"I'm Phil, by the way…" Phil interjected, he wanted to get away from this subject as fast as possible.

"Dan." he smiled, extending his hand for Phil to shake. Their friendship had grown its first bud.

Where have I seen him before? Dan scoured his memory for where he knew Phil from, but to no avail. I know him… was the only thought running through Dan's head as he typed "Phil Lester" in the Google search bar. Nothing.

He dug around his pocket and his fingers closed around a ripped napkin. He pulled the limp paper out and read the number scrawled on it in blue pen. Dan, grabbing his phone without taking his eyes off the napkin, punched in the numbers and waited in anticipation of the dial tone.

"Hello?" a tired voice answered. Dan went into panic mode, what if he had awoken them from sleep? interrupted a deep moment? The endless questions swirled inside his head and all that came out of his mouth was incoherent gibberish.

"What?" the voice was clearly awake now.

"Hi, uh." Dan tried again, although it would've sounded normal if his voice hadn't gone and cracked.

"What do you want?" she asked knowingly.

"I, um," Dan started, pausing to think of the best way to phrase the sentence, "I need help with something."

Her evil giggle crackled through the phone.

"I'll be right there." she cackled again and the line went dead.

Bing! The sound of the doorbell echoed around the apartment. Dan reluctantly stood from his armadillo position on the floor and undid the lock on the door.

"Hello, Dan." she walked in without being invited, her vanilla scent blinding Dan's nose as she sauntered past him.

The twenty-year-old was intimidated, and it wasn't because of her fiery red locks or the way she held herself, though those did add to the equations of why he was afraid of her.

"Who would you like to know about, Danny boy?" her voice teasing and sickly sweet. She trapped him against the wall and gripped his collar, pulling it towards her.

"Who are you willing to pay the price for?" she whispered menacingly in his ear, her lips breathing out onto his jaw.

"Ph-ph-ph," Dan began, but she had intentionally got him aroused and he couldn't concentrate very well.

"Who?" she asked innocently, slowly pressing her body against his.

"Phi-" his answer was interrupted by an instinct moan of pleasure, for she had begun to kiss along his jawline.

This is how it always went, her teasing torturing him until he couldn't give an answer, or a coherent one anyways.

She grinded her hips into his.

"Who?!" she gritted through her teeth.

Dan closed his eyes again and thought about the blue-eyed Phil, and for a moment he gained a surge of confidence, just enough to spit out his request.

"Phil. Lester." he enunciated, and she stopped what she was doing because those were the rules and she was a woman of her word.

She released him and beckoned for Dan to join her at the lounge table where she pulled out a small laptop. It started immediately and he waited as she did her summary of everything that ever mentioned Phil Lester from the UK.

She printed it out for him and smiled.

"Nice confidence burst today, Dan. Although, I hope it doesn't appear next time."

There shouldn't even be a next time, he thought. But, whenever he met someone she was always the first person he called.

"Thanks, Delilah." He faked a smile as he shooed her out the door.

He sighed heavily and sat where he had been sitting before and read the first line on the paper.

Phil Lester

Known for:

-drug dealing

-stealing

Oh, dear, what have I gotten myself into…

He sighed again internally. It was going to be a long night.


	3. Two: Rolling Downhill

Phil was alone in his flat when he heard the sound of sirens, startling him from his teetering-on-the-edge-of-consciousness state.

"Couldn't you go and get stabbed in front of someone else's flat, I'm trying to sleep." he mumbled to himself. Running his fingers through his messy black hair, Phil rolled around his bed.

"Urghgghgh…" he groaned in annoyance.

Reluctantly he reached under the sheets and grasped at his laptop, which was covered in various stickers.

Placing the hunk of metal on his stomach, he opened it and started scrolling through Tumblr. I'm wasting my days more efficiently than I thought…he speculated sarcastically.

His phone rang for a good two minutes before Phil finally decided to answer.

"Hello?" he said as he yawned. Nobody was there so he ended the mysterious call.

Ding! He had gotten a text message from an unknown number.

"It's coming for you." the text stated bluntly.

Phil didn't who it was but he did understand what the message meant.

The darkness were coming for him and he had to find a way out before they caught him.

"Shit." he cussed under his breath, though Phil rarely cursed, even when he was high.

Scrambling to find everything, Phil had put together a duffel bag of bare life essentials and, of course, everything he kept that meant something to him- his family picture, taken the day they went on vacation when Phil was 16; his lion plush, which he had had for a while now and had grown on him immensely; his notebook, which held all the reasons in the world why Phil knew he was Phil.

Still lowly mumbling profanities, Phil sauntered to the door and looked around. He was going to miss this place, even though it might not have been the nicest of flats, it was still home to him, from its leaky sinks to its stained ceilings. He sighed and walked out the door, already regretting his decision, even if it kept everyone he knew and loved safe.

Sometimes, when there's a fork in the road of life, you drive down the one that is not the better choice, because you are young and carefree and what could possibly hurt you? The choice you make is all fun, no work, but the only catch is that all of it is temporary. It won't go on forever and you are not immortal and you don't realize it until it's too late. You are lost in a dark forest of bad decisions and you can't seem to find your way out.

* * *

In the underground [subway], Phil hastily searched for that little slip of paper that Dan scribbled his number on.

"Ugh, where is it, I could've sworn I had it an hour ago…" he muttered.

"Looking for something?" a young voice chuckled slightly. Phil pivoted around to see Dan starting to lose it, breaking down laughing, and holding the damned slip of paper between his index and middle fingers.

Phil giggled a bit as well, though trying to keep it in as much as he could, which wasn't very much, you see. And if you were a stranger you would walk by and find two young adults snickering hysterically without a care in the world what anybody else thought.

While Dan was distracted, Phil, still chuckling, took the paper from his two fingers.

Finally, Phil put the number in his phone under "Dan the Crazy Man".

"So, what are you doing here?" Dan asked, more calm than he had been a moment before.

"I, uh," Phil pondered for a moment, trying to come up with an inconspicuous excuse, "I'm wanted to, uh, do something else with my life for once." he convinced himself this was a good enough excuse but Dan resumed his interrogating.

"Where are you going?" he asked.

"I want to explore," Phil stated happily,"and I wouldn't really mind if I had someone to share the memories with." he hinted at bringing Dan along with him to target the younger's awkwardness and anti-social activities, thus making him feel uncomfortable enough to refuse Phil's offer.

"Sure," Dan surprised the older with his answer, "it's not like I was doing anything productive before this. Why not?"

Phil, flabbergasted (who even uses that word anymore, jeez), attempted to on the spot come up with something to reply to that. He was counting on Dan not coming with him. Shit. he thought.

"Let's go to Starbucks." Phil giggled at his bad common white girl voice and forgot why he was on the underground in the first place. Out of all the things he could be doing right now, he was having fun. Dan couldn't help but notice that when the ebony haired boy laughed his tongue lifted. He thought it was cute. And the two men stayed like that until someone announced they were in the city.

* * *

After about two hours Dan had to leave to go do God-knows-what. Phil, no longer laughing or smiling, remembered what he was supposed to be doing. Sighing longingly at Dan's figure getting smaller and smaller seemed like a more important priority at the time.

Phil trudged down the rainy pavement until the sun went down. This was the time that everything in his wasted world happened. He slipped quietly into a bar and scanned the crowd for one particular redhead. That was when he spotted her, fuzzy red locks peaking out from under the dark hood obscuring her face. Unrecognizable.

As he walked towards the white table, the woman's mouth began to open.

"Why didn't you pick a place less obvious, you imbecile!" she hissed at Phil.

Phil rolled his eyes and replied, "The more obvious the less danger."

He knew they wouldn't hurt this many innocent people, they weren't too heartless.

The red haired woman seethed as Phil cautiously sat in the velvet seat across from her. Her beady eyes stared into Phil's soul and he felt that all his secrets, the darkest under lock and key, were being discovered. "What do you want?" she asked bluntly, thought it sounded more like a command than a question. "I want protection. Not for me, though. Someone else." Phil broke their eye contact and fiddled with his fingers. "Oh," she cooed, "does little Philly have a friend?" she dragged out the last word in a way that made the six letter word sound like an insult. "I, uh," Phil stuttered, "I do have a friend, actually." She smiled, pressing him with her eyes for more extensive details. "His name is Dan. And so far he's my first real best friend. I don't want him getting hurt." I shouldn't have befriended him. Phil thought. He's just going to get in their way and get himself killed. But then, what in hell am I supposed to do? I can't just unfriend him.

"Gosh, this is complicated." Phil murmured.

Dan was a good person and Phil was afraid of what was going to happen to him if he didn't get him to safety

* * *

Dan lay awake that night sandwiched between his plaid black sheets when his mind started to wonder further into an abyss of darkness that whispered horrible deeds and insults in his head. He tried to block them out but the whispering became louder and louder until it began to scream all the insults spat out under students' breaths as he walked in the school hallway. Nerd. Loser. Freak. Dan covered his ears, to which didn't help the situation at all.

He rolled out of his warm cocoon and the bed creaked as he rose. Walking kind of like a zombie, he trudged to the bathroom and kneeled beneath the mat next to the shower. He carefully reached under it and pulled out the only thing that could damage a person physically while they delusionally think that it helps them emotionally.


End file.
